


the sun is always shining when i'm with you

by KH310-S (Author_of_Kheios)



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Tragedy, Gen, Hanahaki Disease, Heavy Angst, M/M, One-Sided Attraction, Other, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-31
Updated: 2019-07-31
Packaged: 2020-07-27 20:26:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20052049
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Author_of_Kheios/pseuds/KH310-S
Summary: "When were you going to tell me?" Connor looks up from the sink, not entirely surprised to see Hank standing in the doorway with a look of sympathy and heartbreak.It can't match his own heartbreak."...Never."





	the sun is always shining when i'm with you

**Author's Note:**

> This idea has been bugging me nonstop at work for the past few days, so I finally gave up and I'm literally writing this in AO3, no beta, no edits, so forgive me any mistakes as this is literally just my brain vomiting up words to get this idea out of my head before it starts to affect of other projects.
> 
> HEED THE TAGS! There is a major character death in this fic!!
> 
> Side note: the title is taken from one of the meanings of daffodils.

"When were you going to tell me?" Connor looks up from the sink, not entirely surprised to see Hank standing in the doorway with a look of sympathy and heartbreak.

It can't match his own heartbreak.

"...Never." He lets his emotions modulate his voice, and it comes out soft, apologetic. Hank flinches slightly and steps into the bathroom, reaching out to pluck a missed petal from Connor's lips. The small white acacia petal is smeared with blue.

"Acacia is chaste love," Hank notes, dropping the petal into the sink and then gesturing to the larger yellow petals soaked in blue and dotted with other white petals. "Daffodils are unrequited love; no surprise..."

"And high regard," Connor agrees quietly, ashamed to have been discovered after so long of hiding it. "You know the language of flowers?" Hank shrugs, grimacing.

"My wife was obsessed with them. She... She always thought hanahaki was a beautiful, romantic thing, and that a substitute cure could be found in the flowers themselves. She was always on about how it should be impossible, and how certain flowers were more likely to show up than others, and all that shit. Never really made sense to me, but I picked up on some of the meanings. I, um... I gave her daffodils on our first date. For it's other meanings, I mean..."

"An excellent choice," Connor whispers, staring at his blood in the sink, at _his_ flowers, stained from tearing up the inside of his chassis.

"Connor... Kid..." Hank hesitates, starting to reach for Connor's hand but withdrawing the moment Connor twitches away from him. "Talk to me."

"About what, Lieutenant?" Connor says, deliberate. Hank growls in annoyance, but doesn't react.

"You know what; don't go walling me off, kid, not now, after all we've been through together. It's your fault I'm not at the bottom of a bottle or staring down the barrel of a gun, your fault I socialise and have friends now, and I'm not just gonna let you off scott free, you hear me?"

"You can't help me, Hank," Connor snaps now, looking up sharply and hoping the pinching pain behind his pump isn't affecting his emoting programmes. "I don't want to be helped."

"Yeah, well, neither did I!" Hank retorts, just as sharp. "You didn't give up on me, Connor; I'm not about to give up on you!"

"There is no-" Connor erupts in a fit of coughing then, interrupting his claim and bending him over the sink as his chassis trembles with the effort to expel an entire daffodil head and three small acacia blossoms. Hank's heart sinks at the sight and he reaches out to rub gently over Connor's back, shifting closer to support him if needed until the fit is over.

"Connor... Just tell me who it is," he begs, voice strained. Connor doesn't reply for a long moment, staring at the full flowers coated in thirium like a macabre painting by a morbid android artist.

"...The first full blooms..." Connor whispers. His voice is also strained, partly in horror, partly from the damage to his vocal processors by the passage of things not meant to pass.

"Connor," Hank pleads, gripping his shoulder tightly. "Tell me. I'll even swear not to tell them. Is it someone I know?"

"You could say that," Connor says dryly, shrugging off his hand and turning away from him.

Hank's gut seizes.

"It's not... me... is it?" he breathes, terrified. Connor turns back around quickly.

"No!" he blurts, just as fearful. Then more firmly, "No. It's not you. I love you dearly, Hank, but as a father figure, nothing more."

"Thank God..." Hank puffs, grabbing the edge of the sink to steady himself in his relief. "I couldn't..." _I couldn't bear it if you died because of me. I couldn't handle losing another son. I couldn't stand the thought of a world without you in it._ He doesn't say any of that. Instead, he just breathes another, "Thank God..."

A tense, humming silence pulses between them, each wanting to say things, each holding back with unease.

"...Who is it?" Hank finally asks again. Connor looks away from him, all the more ashamed.

"...You won't believe me," he mutters. "You'll laugh at me..."

"Of course n- I would never laugh at you for being in love with someone!" Hank proclaims, indignant. "And trust me, I've seen the DPD's biggest asshole skyrocket in popularity because he was tamed by a relationship with a baby-faced robot with a murder mode; nothing will shock me."

Connor cringes and then convulses, jumping back to the sink for another bout. This time Hank stares in stunned silence, the dots connecting.

"Connor..." he says slowly once the fit is over and a half dozen new flowers and whole handfuls more petals fill the sink. "Connor, son, do you...? Is this...? For Gavin?"

The silence stretches again, and Connor doesn't lift his head from the sink. Just when Hank is about to ask... something - he isn't sure what - he hears a soft whine. It takes him a moment to realise the shaking of Connor's shoulders is not because of the coughing fit.

"I c- I can't..." Connor breathes, voice strained by a building sob that breaks free and jolts his entire body. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I can't stop, I tried, I-"

"Shh, shh," Hank hushes, pulling Connor against his chest and holding him tightly. "Oh Connor, it's okay... It's okay, son; don't apologise."

Neither of them says any more on the matter; when Connor has cried himself out, Hank ushers him into his own bedroom and coaxes him into bed, curling up with him in a way that brings up just a slight tug of nostalgia as Connor slips into stasis. The next morning, Hank wakes to a clean bathroom and a cheerful partner, and he doesn't say a word.

\----------

"Why Gavin?" Hank asks several weeks later after being awoken to a much more violent fit of hacking; he found Connor in the tub, dazed and covered in flowers and thirium, and it took a long time to clean the poor android and get him back in bed, once Cole's and now his. Hank laid on top of the comforter, leaning against the headboard with Connor snuggled against his hip, the way Cole used to do when Hank read him bedtime stories, and the tug of nostalgia returns, a little more strongly.

"Mm?" Connor hums, LED flickering as he pulls out of stasis.

"Why Gavin?" Hank repeats, gently stroking his fingers through silky hair. "He's pretty much the worst possible candidate; didn't he try to shoot you? On a number of occasions?"

"...Mmhm."

"And he's in a pretty solid relationship with Nines..." Hank persists.

"I know," Connor cuts in before he can continue, slightly irritated. "I fell for him _because_ of Nines."

"...I thought you said he was like a brother to you..." Hank frowns, perplexed and mildly concerned.

"Not like that," Connor mutters, opening one soft brown eye to give him a halfhearted glare. "I mean, what he became because of Nines... I fell in love with the Gavin in love with Nines."

"...I think Gavin's been in a poly relationship before."

"Hank..." Connor growls in warning, making Hank raise his hands.

"Okay, okay, fine..." He sighs and goes back to stroking Connor's hair for a moment before saying, "You know there's a surgery, right?"

"To remove the flowers?" Connor mumbles. "I am aware. But the success rate is less than 3 percent without side effects, and the most likely outcome is the loss of emotion entirely. I do not want to take the chance of becoming a machine again."

"But-"

"Hank," Connor snips, lifting his head for a proper glare. Hank meets it evenly, fully prepared to stand his ground on this, but there's a dead look of acceptance deep in Connor's gaze, and Hank is far too familiar with it to fight it.

"Okay," he says softly, heart already aching with the anticipation of losing Connor. Shifting his hand, he lightly brushes his thumb over the android's smooth, pliant cheek, synth-skin warm under his touch. "Okay."

\----------

"Connor!" Hank catches him, shoving through the explosion of daffodils and acacia pouring from the android's mouth as he shudders and jerks in Hank's arms. His eyes are rolled back, and thirium streams from his nose and ears, coating the flowers in grisly blue as Hank sinks to the ground as gently as he can, panic squeezing him in a vice grip.

"The fuck is happening??" Gavin demands, horrified. Nines grabs his arm, pale with agony, and he immediately turns his attention to his metal boyfriend. "Nines?? Nines, babe, what's wrong??"

"Hanahaki," Nines rasps, vocal processor glitching and sparking static. "He has Hanahaki Disease. And it's at the end of the final stage." Hank's heart lurches at the confirmation of what he suspected, and he pulls Connor as close as he can, struggling with the android's weight.

"Connor... Connor, son, hold on, okay?" His voice cracks and hot wet pricks at his eyes, welling up faster than he can blink it back.

"But that's fucking...!" Gavin breaks off, confused and unsettled, and rocks back and forth on his feet like he wants to help but has no idea how, and it's clearly killing him to feel so helpless. Nines, all the more so; the most advanced android ever created, and he can do nothing in the face of a delicate flower.

"H- H- Han- H-" Connor chokes out between weak, strangled gasps.

"Shh, I'm here," Hank says immediately, brushing flowers and blood away from his mouth. "I'm right here, son; I'm not going anywhere."

"We c- We can fix this," Gavin says, "right?" Ri- There's gotta be a way to fix this."

"The only way to fix it," Nines says, vocal processor still somewhat staticky, "is for the object of the victim's affection to requite their love."

"E- Easy!" Gavin exclaims, entirely uncertain and just desperate to try anything. "Who doesn't love Connor? Anyone would be lucky to have him!"

"It's not that fucking simple, Reed!" Hank snaps, all of his frustration and impotence surging forward as venom in his tone. He casts a weak glare at the man, wishing to God, or _any_ higher being, that it was anyone else.

"Like shit!" Gavin counters, clinging to a frayed rope that's already falling. "We just gotta find out who he fell for and let 'em know he has a crush!"

"There isn't enough time," Nines murmurs brokenly, staring at his predecessor and brother in pure, agonising sorrow.

"And even if there were," Hank growls, "there's a fucking reason he hasn't said anything!"

"Well why the fuck not??" Gavin demands, snapping. "We can still-"

"It's you, you fucking ass!!" Hank bellows, stunning him to silence. "He fucking fell for you because Nines made you a better person!"

"...M-me?" Gavin says weakly, pale with dawning realisation. "But I- I don't..."

"Love him back?" Hank hisses. "No shit, Sherlock! He kept it to himself because he didn't want to get between you two, and now he's dying and there's no way to save him! I'm losing my son _again_, and there's not a damn thing any of us can do to stop it!"

A gentle squeeze of his wrist interrupts his tirade and yanks his gaze away from the shocked couple. Connor is no longer coughing up flowers and roots and blood, but he looks... wrong, somehow, like the only thing still human left in him is the light in his eyes and the ghost of a smile on his bloodied lips. He reaches up and touches Hank's cheek, smudging thirium across his skin and beard.

"I'm here," he chokes, barely intelligible past a half-broken vocal processor. "I'll al-ways b- be here..." His hand slides down to Hank's chest, pressing firmly over his heart. "Ri-ght h- here."

"No... No, Connor," Hank sobs, clinging to him. "Please, Connor..." Sniffing back his tears and trying desperately to get some sort of calm, he looks up at Nines. "Isn't there _anything_ we can do? Can't you, like, download his memories or something?" Nines is already shaking his head, gaze never leaving Connor's face.

"The roots have corrupted his system, and even if they hadn't, his coding is different due to deviation; to place his memories in another body would only cause a cascading failure and completely destroy him regardless. If I had known even two weeks ago..." He trails off, clearly blaming himself for not noticing something amiss, for not scanning his brother more regularly and in more detail, for letting this slip by him at all.

Gavin grabs his hand, squeezing tightly, and Connor bucks, trying to cough but unable. Hank holds him, heart cracking a little more at every wrenching sound, and Gavin looks away, ashamed and guilty. Everyone blames himself, but guilt can do nothing to halt the inevitable.

For a split second, when Connor goes still, Hank dares to hope there's still one last chance to say goodbye.

Until he sees that Connor's LED is entirely off.

A choked sob rips from his throat and fluids soak his face as he hunches over the empty husk in his lap, surrounded by thirium and daffodils and acacia, and then his sobs become ragged screams at the heavens for taking another child from him.

And Nines, still staring at his brother's face, knows he will never forget that the last thing Connor saw was his and Gavin's linked hands.

**Author's Note:**

> good fucking god i made myself legitimately sob
> 
> i am a gross mess right now and if youre not the same, youre either lying or you have no soul. if you are, feel free to rant at me in the comments.


End file.
